Mariners' ills make advertisers edgy

After two seasons of more than 90 losses, Mariners games aren't as lucrative as they once were for FSN Northwest, and advertisers are starting to get nervous.

TV ratings for the team have declined by 58 percent since the Mariners' record 116-win season in 2001, when the average rating per game was a 14.9. Through the first half of May, the average game is pulling in a 6.3 rating, which means it is being watched by 6.3 percent of households with a television in the network's coverage area.

The good news is that the 6.3 rating is still high enough to place the Mariners third in all of Major League Baseball, despite falling attendance and the team's 17-22 record as of May 16.

The fall in ratings comes at a time when attendance at Safeco Field has fallen every year since a record 3.5 million people attended the games in 2002. Last year, 2.7 million people attended. On May 8, the smallest crowd ever -- 16,102 fans -- passed through the turnstiles.

"Our ratings today are not what we want them to be or what the Mariners want them to be," said Mark Shuken, vice president and general manager at Bellevue-based Fox Sports Network (FSN) Northwest.

FSN Northwest, one of several regional sports cable networks owned by the Rupert Murdoch-run News Corp., covers Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and parts of Alaska. It will show 111 Mariners games this season, and thus far has not lost any major advertisers except through the normal cycle of attrition, according to Shuken. But a closer look at the business suggests the right to broadcast Mariners games isn't as valuable as it was when the club was a regular American League West contender just a few years ago.

Given the fall in ratings, FSN acknowledged it can't charge advertisers what it once did to advertise during Mariners games.

"Obviously, with ratings in decline, Mariners broadcasts don't bring in as much money as they did in 2001," said FSN Northwest spokeswoman Jill Wiggins.

Randy Adamack, director of communications for the Mariners, said the team has a multiyear agreement with FSN. It has been widely reported that the agreement, which began with the 2001 season, is a 10-year deal.

The Mariners don't get a cut of the money generated by advertising during their games. The team charges FSN an annual rights fee that goes up every year, although Adamack declined to say by how much.

Rising rights fees and falling ratings are not a good combination, according to one sports marketing expert.

"As stand-alone programming, it might be hard to justify carrying a mediocre Mariners product," said Paul Swangard, managing director of the Warsaw Center for Sports Marketing at the University of Oregon in Eugene. "So, you'd have to hope they see value beyond the ad dollars."

By holding on to the Mariners, FSN maintains its position in the market and legitimizes itself as the only sports network in the region.

Doug Bayne, director of marketing at Walla Walla-based Banner Bank, said the company has advertised during Mariners games since the record 2001 season. The bank currently has a one-year contract with FSN. When he sees the team's TV ratings, he gets antsy.

"I have concerns and I think certainly as the season goes on and we start planning for 2007, the ratings will be a factor in our strategy," Bayne said. "We're not contemplating canceling with the Mariners at this time."

But other advertisers have, according to Mindy Craft, a media buyer with Seattle-based Dave Syferd & Partners. The marketing firm also represents Banner Bank, buying advertising on the bank's behalf.

"We've seen a 20 percent decrease in the amount of money spent by advertisers during Mariners games since 2001," said Craft. "It's definitely tied to the team's performance. At this point, we only support Banner Bank as a Mariners client."

Nor is Craft seeing much demand from current or prospective clients to advertise during M's games. Part of that, she said, is that the Mariners simply might not be a good fit for its host of clients in terms of which audiences those advertisers are trying to reach.

In addition to Banner Bank, the Mariners have numerous large advertisers, including Northwest Chevy Dealers, Qwest Communications International Inc., Jack in the Box, Geico and Southwest Airlines.

In its one-year contract with FSN, Southwest Airlines has what is known as a "guaranteed rating," which protects the airline in the case of a drop in ratings during Mariners games, said Southwest's senior manager of sports marketing, Andy Allman.

If the rating for a particular broadcast doesn't meet that guarantee, FSN must provide Southwest with additional spots in future games or during other programming at no charge.

In 2002 and 2003, when the Mariners won 93 games apiece, the guaranteed rating was a 10.5. In 2004, when they went 63-99, the guaranteed rating was an 11. Since then, it has fallen every year, Allman said.

The decline in the guaranteed rating over the past two years is an indication that Southwest doesn't expect the Mariners to produce the stellar ratings they did between 2001 and 2003, Swangard said.

"They're being realistic that a team that's been struggling wouldn't see 'American Idol' ratings numbers," he said. "They see a correlation between winning and broadcast ratings."

FSN's Wiggins acknowledged that every time the network has to provide Southwest, or any advertiser, with a free ad spot, it's "a lost revenue opportunity."

Southwest has advertised during Mariners broadcasts since 1994 and Allman expects the airline to continue. It won't do so blindly, however.

"We do one-year deals so we can protect ourselves," he said. "If we continue to see a decline, we take that into consideration for next year. But (the Mariners) are a good way to reach our core demographic of adults 25 to 54."

One aspect of the situation the team and FSN find hopeful is the fact that ratings for Mariners games are still among the best in baseball, despite a poor on-field performance.

The Mariners' Adamack attributes the phenomenon to die-hard fans who attend games and tune into broadcasts because they are devoted to the team, win or lose.

"Compared to other Major League markets, there's still a good level of interest here," he said. "I think it's the hard-core fans that are the core of our viewership right now. There's definitely less casual fans tuning in for an extended period of time."

But it's those casual fans that help pro sports team make the lion's share of their money, said the Warsaw Center's Swangard.

"You never make money off the backs of loyalists because they're the ones that come whether you win or lose," he said. "You make money off the casual fans because there's more of them."

One of the challenges a struggling baseball team faces in general is the length of the game, he said.

"It's a three-hour game," Swangard said. "You're asking the viewer to invest a lot of time in the product."

Ultimately, the fastest way to get ratings and stadium attendance back up is to start winning more ballgames, he said.